Artist Spotlight: Hozier

I am a very visual listener. I tend to consider music in shapes and colors. Music helps me create a painting or an animated sequence in my mind from which I can derive meaning. That’s where my emotion comes from. However, there are some artists who are capable of obfuscating with raw feeling the lens with which I regard my internal canvas. I no longer know what I’m looking at, only that I’m feeling very intensely. It feels as though their rich, sometimes dissonant, sometimes sweet tones whip up a storm that rains heavily into my soul. The river swells beyond its borders, a flash flood. There is no time to take the scene in, to understand the picture – all one can do is be taken by the current.

Andrew Hozier-Byrne is proving to be one of those artists. Better than anything I could write, listen to “Take Me To Church” and you will understand that ineffable feeling that for me begins in the gut and gushes upwards. Relatively new on the international scene Hozier has released 8 tracks over two EPs and has met with rave reviews. You can listen to Hozier here. Both EPs are out now via Rubyworks.